I’ve been continuing to use this technique of giving voices to individual subagents, and I’ve still been finding it extremely useful.
And there are some new subagents to add to the list:
DP: Dark Peer, the agent that’s in charge of anything that feels too dark for any of the other agents to say. This includes lots of self-criticism, and criticism of others. If there’s something that want to say, but are afraid that saying it would be too rude, and we’re talking to someone who already knows about our subagents, then DP will go ahead and say what he wanted to say. We were surprised to find that this subagent actually enjoys getting angry, and writing angry rants. This subagent is also in charge of reporting “negative” feelings, while HP is in charge of reporting “positive” feelings. This agent uses the avatar of a dark, shadowy, genderless, anthropomorphic rabbit.
Recently HP merged with CP, and they share the pink bunny avatar, and they use the name HP. And PP merged with SP, and they share the gray bunny avatar, and they use the name PP.
These three bunny avatars are now our main voices. Most of our internal conversations are between these three voices, with other voices joining in when they have something specific to say.
Some other subagents that were added recently were:
ORG: Obscure Reference Generator: for whenever an obscure reference pops into our head that seems vaguely on-topic, but all of the other subagents are too embarrassed to mention it. This voice just reports the quote or whatever it is that popped into our head.
SoU: Sense of Urgency. The voice that’s constantly telling me that whatever I’m working on at the moment urgently needs to be finished as soon as possible. Or if I’m not doing anything important, it’s constantly telling me that I should be doing something important. Thinking about existential risks, and our responsibility to do something about them, seems to have put SoU permanently into full-panic mode. This module is causing us lots of trouble, and we’re still trying to figure out how to resolve these issues.
RoM: Routine Module. The voice that’s constantly telling us to keep following the usual routines, and that gets really nervous whenever we break one of the usual routines. This module is causing us lots of trouble, and we’re still trying to figure out how to resolve these issues.
AM: Altruist Module. I should mention that I was an Altruist, before I became a Utilitarian. And so now I have a module in my brain that’s constantly looking for opportunities to help others at our expense, without bothering to calculate how much help at how much expense. And it pushes really hard for us to act on these opportunities. It also fights really hard to prevent us from ever doing anything that would harm or annoy or inconvenience anyone in any way, even in situations where it’s obvious that inconveniencing the other person is necessary or worthwhile. And this module is older and stronger than UM, the Utilitarian Module. It’s often causing lots of trouble, and we’re still trying to figure out how to resolve these issues.
EG: Excuse Generator. It gets activated so often that we decided to give it its own name and voice. It’s often causing lots of trouble, actively trying to prevent us from updating on new information.
And sometimes a random thought needs to be given a voice, and we don’t know what subagent that thought is coming from, and so we assign the label ”?P” to that thought.
I would like to mention that the City of Lights technique is at its best when it is used to think through the various aspects of a specific problem without feeling pressed to aim at only one set of considerations. Using lots of subagents, or using them all the time, is correlated with something being systematically wrong. If you need them, far be it from me to stop you, but I get by with two in virtually every situation where they’re called for and have never felt the need for more than six.
I’ve been continuing to use this technique of giving voices to individual subagents, and I’ve still been finding it extremely useful.
And there are some new subagents to add to the list:
DP: Dark Peer, the agent that’s in charge of anything that feels too dark for any of the other agents to say. This includes lots of self-criticism, and criticism of others. If there’s something that want to say, but are afraid that saying it would be too rude, and we’re talking to someone who already knows about our subagents, then DP will go ahead and say what he wanted to say. We were surprised to find that this subagent actually enjoys getting angry, and writing angry rants. This subagent is also in charge of reporting “negative” feelings, while HP is in charge of reporting “positive” feelings. This agent uses the avatar of a dark, shadowy, genderless, anthropomorphic rabbit.
Recently HP merged with CP, and they share the pink bunny avatar, and they use the name HP. And PP merged with SP, and they share the gray bunny avatar, and they use the name PP.
These three bunny avatars are now our main voices. Most of our internal conversations are between these three voices, with other voices joining in when they have something specific to say.
Some other subagents that were added recently were:
ORG: Obscure Reference Generator: for whenever an obscure reference pops into our head that seems vaguely on-topic, but all of the other subagents are too embarrassed to mention it. This voice just reports the quote or whatever it is that popped into our head.
SoU: Sense of Urgency. The voice that’s constantly telling me that whatever I’m working on at the moment urgently needs to be finished as soon as possible. Or if I’m not doing anything important, it’s constantly telling me that I should be doing something important. Thinking about existential risks, and our responsibility to do something about them, seems to have put SoU permanently into full-panic mode. This module is causing us lots of trouble, and we’re still trying to figure out how to resolve these issues.
RoM: Routine Module. The voice that’s constantly telling us to keep following the usual routines, and that gets really nervous whenever we break one of the usual routines. This module is causing us lots of trouble, and we’re still trying to figure out how to resolve these issues.
AM: Altruist Module. I should mention that I was an Altruist, before I became a Utilitarian. And so now I have a module in my brain that’s constantly looking for opportunities to help others at our expense, without bothering to calculate how much help at how much expense. And it pushes really hard for us to act on these opportunities. It also fights really hard to prevent us from ever doing anything that would harm or annoy or inconvenience anyone in any way, even in situations where it’s obvious that inconveniencing the other person is necessary or worthwhile. And this module is older and stronger than UM, the Utilitarian Module. It’s often causing lots of trouble, and we’re still trying to figure out how to resolve these issues.
EG: Excuse Generator. It gets activated so often that we decided to give it its own name and voice. It’s often causing lots of trouble, actively trying to prevent us from updating on new information.
And sometimes a random thought needs to be given a voice, and we don’t know what subagent that thought is coming from, and so we assign the label ”?P” to that thought.
And don’t forget the subagent that likes finding, making, and naming other subagents.
I would like to mention that the City of Lights technique is at its best when it is used to think through the various aspects of a specific problem without feeling pressed to aim at only one set of considerations. Using lots of subagents, or using them all the time, is correlated with something being systematically wrong. If you need them, far be it from me to stop you, but I get by with two in virtually every situation where they’re called for and have never felt the need for more than six.
Right. Normally only two or three, or sometimes four, are involved in any particular conversation.
Er, wait, no, normally it’s the three bunnies, plus maybe one other subagent.